Title: Midterm Hints and Procedures
Course: CPS 161: An Intro to Programming with Java - DL MM MASTER

Midterm Hints and Procedures

Procedures

1. This test consists of short answer questions (i.e. multiple choice). There are no programs to write and you are not allowed to use Eclipse on this test, because Eclipse could answer many of the questions.
2. The test is open book, open notes, and open web.
3. You can take the test online with a time limit of 4 hours. The test doesn't abort after 4 hours, but I will know how long you took on the test. If you need lots of time for tests (more than 4 hours), please take it in the testing center.
4. You can take the test before the due date, but once you start the test you must complete it.
5. On the test, I want to know if you understand the Java in the test and not whether you can type the Java into Eclipse, run it and discover the answer(most of you would never do this, but I have had students who do this kind of a thing).

Hints: Things to know in preparation for the test.

There are some sample files that will be referenced from the test. You might want to print these out before you take the test. Note that you can see the files by clicking on the test, before you click on the blackboard "Begin" button. You should be able to take these in with you if you choose to take the test at the testing center. If you don't have them printed off, you will be able to click on appropriate links in the test to display them when they are needed.

Things to Know:

- String concatenation involving integers, doubles, etc.
- integer arithmetic
- intermixing ints with doubles in arithmetic
- if statement logic and boolean expressions
- switch statements
- for loops
- while loops
- do while loops
- overloaded methods (i.e methods with the same name but different parameters)
- Constructing classes and Class constructors
- String methods such as indexOf, substring, charAt, length, toLowerCase
- StringTokenizer
- == versus equals with String classes or other Classes
- Parameter passing for primitives like int, double, etc.
- Parameter passing for Mutable classes(most classes are Mutable)
- Parameter passing for Immutable classes (String, Wrapper classes like Integer)
- Class references (i.e. setting one class reference = to another reference)
- Using copy constructors
- Make sure you understand what you did in JH2 and JH3

Midterm Characterisitics:

The midterm is made up of short answer questions (i.e. multiple choice, true/false, etc.). Often the questions will have a small piece of code and will ask things like what is the output of this small program. You will have to answer this without using Eclipse. The midterm will not ask you to write any programs. The purpose of the midterm is to see if you understand the Java concepts covered so far. You can take the test online. Students who understand the material well can complete the test in about an hour. I specify a 4 hour time limit. This should be plenty of time for students who want a lot of time. However, I don't want an unlimited amount of time because people could then have enough time to cheat by typing the questions into Eclipse and running the programs to find out the answers. If you want unlimited time, you need to take the test in the testing center where Eclipse is not installed on their computers.

Last Modified: October 9, 2015 9:02 AM